What is a network card?
A network card is a card to let the computer connect to a network and the internet. It is often integrated on the motherboard but, as shown in the picture above, they are also in form of a PCI card. These cards can be attached to the motherboard using an available PCI slot. There are several types of cards which all have their own speed. The speeds can be different from 10 Mbps, 100 Mbps and 1000 Mbps. This depends on the type of it.
Each card has an own unique physical address which is called the MAC address.A MAC address is an address which identifies the card in a network and therefore they have to be unique. Let me explain: A MAC address can be compared with a name. If in 1 room are more people with the same name like Michael and you call 'Michael' then every person with the name Michael will respond to you. This is not what you want because you want to talk only to one Michael.This works the same with MAC addresses. If there were network cards with the same MAC address in a network (=room) and you send a message to that MAC address (=name), the computer will not know for which MAC address the message is mend for. That’s why each card has its own unique MAC address so this isn't possible and the message reaches the right card. A MAC address is an address which has 12 characters which are separated by a '-'. An example of a MAC address could something like this: 00-0H-8D-5B-68-J0 How can you get your MAC address?
The MAC address can be found by: - Click Start
- Click Run
- Type ‘cmd’
- Then in the DOS screen type: ipconfig /all
The computer uses this card for communication over the TCP/IP protocol to other computers which are connected to the network using a network cable or by a wireless network.
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